Dear Friends, all,
I may have missed something in the following, but there seems no mention of
the third leg of the 'labour movement' - the Co-operative Solution - in this
highly relevant Conference.
This is a pity.
Within the 'Labour Movement' there were three co-active strands:
- Historically, the Trade Union Movement resisted the encroachment of
worker rights at 'the coal face' as it were.
- Concurrently, the Parliamentary Movement - the Chartists and their
fore- and antecedents strove to control capitalism's excesses ('holding the
wolf by the ears') through legislation and regulation, while . . .
- The third element, the Co-operative Movement strove to demonstrate
that practical economic alternatives to capitalism - economic co-operatives
- were *demonstrably* viable.
Little by little, this latter strand is coming increasingly to the fore.
To take some examples:
- Here in the UK, ICOM (the Industrial Common Ownership Movement)
supports and demonstrates the efficacy of worker co-operatives
(check, for example The Tower Colliery in South Wales and Greenwich Leisure
in South-East London as examples).
- At the same time, John Monks (General Secretary of the UK's Trade
Union Congress) and Tony Blair (PM) have instituted the Co-operative
Commission to start to examine the present state of the UK Co-operative
Movement
(recall that 25 of the UK's Labour MPs are 'official' Labour and
Co-operative (Party) MPs, while many more Labour MPs are also Co-operative
Party members).
Readers of this List-serve will recall that this move towards co-operation
is the first point in The Fair World Project's action plan,
(which I add at the very end of this posting.)
With due action, Canada could well leap ahead and 'co-operatise' its economy
in parallel with us here ( Canadian readers, will note that the CCF and NDP
history is relevant here!)
As, indeed, could the USA too!
(relevant Listserves are co-opnet from the UK and co-operative bus from
North America)
co-op-ly e-hugs
john courtneidge
Networking:
- The Fair World Project
*******************
ps: Fair World Action Plan appended at end
----------
>From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Subject: FW: Labour Market Regulation & Deregulation Conference
>Date: Tue, Oct 31, 2000, 5:22 PM
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jim Stanford [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: October 31, 2000 7:26 PM
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: Labour Market Regulation & Deregulation Conference
>
>
>
>>Labour Market Regulation and Deregulation:
>>Challenges and Prospects in the 21st Century
>>
>>December 1 - 2, 2000
>>York University, Toronto, Canada
>>
<snip>
>>
>>CONFERENCE CO-SPONSORED BY:
>>
>>Canadian Auto Workers
>>Canadian Labour Congress
>>Canadian Union of Postal Workers
>>Communication, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada
>>Labour Studies, McMaster University
>>Labour Studies, University of Windsor
>>Labour Studies, York University
>>Public Service Alliance of Canada
>>Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
>>United Food and Commercial Workers
>
*******************************
Appendix:
Dear friends, all,
The Fair world Project offers the following Action Plan:
����- to create a Fair, Safe and Peaceful World.
It is the distillation of visits, over four years, by any number of
activists to our weekly table.
It includes the concepts of:
����- corporate stewardship of capital resources (physical resources of
land and related mineral, energy and renewable resources, and of
intellectual resources) in co-operatives, rather than in the presently
formulated corporations.
and, of,
��- guaranteed, fair income for all
Thus:
**************************************
The Fair World Project
����������������*** To Create A Fair, Safe and Peaceful World ***
To do this we must transform the economic system in which we live, so that:
����o People, together in a healthy global community, are in full control of
their lives.
����o Where everyone works for the benefit of all: caring for the long-lived
well being of the whole global ecology � and all its inhabitants.
��������������������** Here, then, is the Fair World action plan **
1) �*Co-operation not Coercion*
�����Convert competitive, market-based businesses into workplace
co-operative partnerships and reorganises monopoly activities as stakeholder
co-operatives, with all co-operatives demonstrably operating according to
the (continuously evolving!) Seven International Co-operative Principles.
2) �*Pre-distribution not Re-distribution*
�������Share out the created wealth through nationally collected
co-operatives taxation, distributed into local, democratically-controlled
Community Banks and, so, make money and credit available for responsible
wealth creation and community development.
3) �*Global stewardship for needs not private ownership for profits*
�������Provide for human needs (health, life-long education, libraries,
telecommunications, transport and so on) on a free-at-the-point-of-use
basis, retaining money as a means, only, for discretionary purchases.
4) �*Fair, guaranteed incomes for all*
�������Introduce guaranteed fair income for all, within upper and lower
brackets and, so, do away with personal taxation (income tax, sales taxes
etc): an end to intra-national exploitation.
5) �*Banking as public service - not as global warfare*
�������Abolish money lending and credit-creation for profit by operating
banking a as community-controlled public services.
7) �*End global exploitation through financial speculation*
�������Reintroduce international exchange controls as necessary.
8) �*All our sisters, our brothers: and all our brothers, our sisters*
�������Make capital grants (not loans) to developing countries: an end to
inter-national exploitation.
Please share widely and deeply!
The Fair World Project ��������contact: john courtneidge
13 North Road Hertford SG14 1LN (UK)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] ��������������(+44) 01992 501854
**********************************************************************
Please print, and share with those not, so far, 'on-line'.
Thanks!
j
************
